Sept. 19, Carson City, Nev.

If you’d wanted to get a piece of the prize money at the $25,000 USHJA International Hunter Derby at Franktown Meadows, your last name had better have been French.

San Jose, Calif.,-based John French positively dominated the stand-alone class, held at the MacLean family’s Franktown Meadows equestrian center. French catch-rode Avery Hellman’s Roccoco to the top of the class and took five of the top seven places. His regular derby contender this season, Crown Affair, picked up the reserve title for Yellow Dog Farm, Mary Sweeny’s first year prodigy Truman took fourth, Hellman’s other junior hunter Winter finished fifth, and Olivia Hellman’s Woodstock claimed seventh.

The only other rider to crack the top spots was Calabasas, Calif., professional Jenny Karazissis. She topped the handy on Forbes to finish third, as well as taking sixth aboard SVS Caremunde Z for Ned Glynn.

After Forbes stepped off his lead for a stride in the first round, Karazissis kicked into a higher gear for Round 2. Calling on their years of experience together, she picked up a hunting pace at the in-gate and never let up, finding the tightest turns through all the rollbacks. She earned matching handy bonus points of 9 from both teams of judges: George Morris and Julie Winkel, and Scott Hofstetter and Jimmy Torano.

Trainer Hope Glynn sent four lovely horses for French and Karazissis to split in the inaugural class, including Roccoco. French had ridden the gelding once before when he filled in for Glynn at the Blenheim Spring Classic in March.

“He’s really nice,” he said. “He’s so slow off the ground and lofty in the air. Nothing bothers him—he was perfect in the in and out toward the in-gate. He’s really comfortable just taking his time.”

A Lovely Field

Bobby Murphy and Torano co-designed both tracks, set on an expansive field at the Maclean family’s farm. The charity event, which benefited the Parasol Foundation, was modeled after the much-lauded Chicago Hunter Derby, complete with an antique car show, myriad vendors and many of the same natural-style fences used in the Midwest edition.

Both rounds featured inviting fences and provided competitors plenty of room to gallop. In the first round there was only one strictly related distance—an in-and-out of straw bales set headed toward the in-gate—and the second featured that double as well as a shorter broken line.

There was much hand wringing over the strong and steady wind that started early and stuck around all day, toppling several fences just before the start of Round 1. But the stars stayed aligned throughout the afternoon, and the only rails that fell during the class—two at the first element of the in-and-out—came thanks to help from hooves, not gusty weather. A few horses dug in their heels at fences, but those refusals appeared to be nerves on the part of greener riders and horses rather than distress over fences.

With several Maclay regionals—including California’s—scheduled the same day as the derby, the start list read a bit short for a $25,000 class, and Rush Weeden scratched Good Advice just before the start of the class to bring the final count to 15. But the light entries in this inaugural competition didn’t reflect the quality of the top contenders, with the judges awarding Roccoco raw scores topping out at 96 in the first round, and a pair of 95s in the second.

“He just jumped amazing today,” said French. “They all really like the field, and the grass was really great. This is the first standalone event on the West Coast, and Bobby did a great job making it special. A lot of times the derbies will have just normal hunter jumps, maybe a few colored rails in there, but this looked really nice.”

Crown Affair stepped up to the occasion for French after a disappointing performance at the Kentucky Horse Park three weeks ago at the $100,000 Chronicle of the Horse/USHJA International Hunter Derby Finals.

“He wasn’t impressed by the indoor,” said French, frankly. “He’s seen a lot of courses and a lot of show rings and that just didn’t grab his attention. But something as impressive as this course brought up the best in him. He jumped very well.”

For more information about the event, visit www.fmhunterderby.com.